


How to Rise, Rise, Rise, and Never Fall

by Chaifootsteps



Category: The Dark Crystal (1982), The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (TV)
Genre: Alien Biology, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Oral Sex, Orgy, young skeksis
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:14:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24085705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chaifootsteps/pseuds/Chaifootsteps
Summary: SkekSo and skekMal are young, complicated, and happy for a little while.(For skekMal.)
Relationships: skekMal/skekSo (Dark Crystal)
Comments: 21
Kudos: 39





	1. Ascend

It had never occurred to skekSo that he should be anything _but_ Emperor. And not simply because that fact was there when he came alive, as much a part of him as his blood and feathers and the strange taste of ozone on his tongue.

The first thing the Skeksis did upon opening their eyes to a world of uncomfortably bright light was to panic and scream. The second was to get two of themselves killed. It was skekSo who had called for, then demanded sanity; skekSo who beckoned them to follow Aughra, who in turn fed them, and after they'd exhausted themselves, took the first watch while everyone else slept. SkekSo who was accounting for everyone's idiosyncrasies as fast as they came up with them.

SkekSo who did not bring them a sense of normalcy so much as build normalcy's very foundation.

As far as skekSo was concerned, if anyone else had cared to step up and take over, they'd had their ample chance and lost it.

***

It was skekZok who first became aware of what their new bodies could do for them...or at the very least, showed enough boldness to act on it. It was possible one of the others acquired a hunch that they could do more with their genitals than simply pissing on the ground until skekSo made them stop, but if they did, they kept it to themselves.

It was skekZok who, upon waking with his erections hard and unfurled, neither hissed at them nor tried to push them back in, but put a calm hand to the bases and began to stroke. The others had flared their feathers suspiciously, but their eyes had followed the up and down motion that was slow and steady, then less so.

_'You'll harm yourself,'_ skekLach had hissed in the words that were there before they had any others. ' _You'll snap it off.'_

_'It feels pleasant.'_

SkekSo, for his part, had observed in silence as skekZok continued to rub himself faster and faster...as his teeth had gritted, his talons scraping the floor, as his tail grew ever more restless, until--

_'Silence! All of you, calm yourselves! Can't you see he lives?'_

For all the chaos of it, that had marked the turning point, the epiphany. The Skeksis, naked and corporeal, realizing that there existed an entire world open to them that had not been open to the UrSkeks.

They masturbated freely and openly in those early days, before the world gave them a reason not to. Bathing, once they settled upon it as a preferable option to grooming themselves with tongue and talon, became a happy excuse to caress themselves. And each night before settling down to sleep, they would indulge in rubbing their erections to completion. To them, it was as wholesome as warm milk, and as natural as stretching in the morning.

And skekSo?

SkekSo would look out over his kingdom and smile, very softly, because any kingdom was better than none.

***

“You're going to have to learn to behave yourselves if you're ever going to have visitors.”

“Behave?”

“Whipping your parts out, lapping between each other's legs. Like a horde of drunken Podlings, each and every one of you.”

SkekSo huffed. “This is our _home._ Do we come into your home and tell you what to wear? No. We do not.”

But when their only connection to the outside world handed him another farl of warm brasselbread, he took it without complaint.

“If that's what Thra wants you to be, all well and good, but you'll scare the Gelfling to death.”

It wouldn't occur to skekSo until much later that she had been at least somewhat joking.

***

Backs up. Shoulders as straight as could be hoped for. Nipples and slits on full display.

The first group of Gelfling representatives, their strange little faces lighting up with a mixture of trepidation at the fierce, colorful beings that stood, fighting the urge to sniff the air, where the UrSkeks once drifted ethereal.

SkekSo, talons folded, an otherwordly harbringer, resplendent in black-indigo feathers.

“Gelfling. The Skeksis welcome you.”

***

And so it went. SkekSo brought them order, skekZok brought them pleasure. SkekOk brought meaning to the UrSkek archives and SkekAyuk brought them the knowledge of how to use fire without hurting themselves. SkekUng and skekVar brought them safety and skekSil, unprompted, brought them song.

And skekMal...well, skekMal brought them their first meat.

Prior to that, they'd eaten well enough, all things considered...dried fish, bread, fruits and nuts. Things the Gelfling brought them, things the Gelfling ate. They all felt the urge to leap at the myriad of things that crawled along the castle walls at night, but none of them ever succeeded in catching one.

But then came skekMal, dragging the half-grown frillbeast by a stiffening hind leg. Missing a Fizzgig's worth of feathers, nursing several vivid bruises, but grinning ear to ear.

They fell on the meat, hissing, tearing at great mouthfuls of hide and making gashes in the belly just so they could attempt to force their heads inside. Before skekSo could chastise them for their crudeness, skekMal was already upon them, knocking them bodily aside and flashing his teeth until they cowered.

“Our Emperor eats first.”

SkekSo, to whom it had never occurred that he _should_ eat first, had to resist the urge to blink in surprise.

“Thank you, skekMal. But I would be remiss not to acknowledge that the kill, and the honor, is yours. The first in our castle. Come, we'll eat together.”

And so they did. SkekSo would never forget, through all the meals that would follow, the vividness and rightness of that warm, fresh liver on his tongue. The sight of skekMal's bruised and bloodied face, peeling away rich strips of thigh. Brows christened with soft fat.

Lying about afterwards with the other Skeksis, satisfied, and the way his breath caught when skekMal licked his face clean.

***

It was not skekMal who first put two and two together, so to speak. _That_ particular honor went to skekOk and skekTek, whose rubbing and aimless grinding one day landed them in exactly the right place, at exactly the right time, that a simple slip of footing let to a eureka moment.

“Isn't that painful?” asked skekEkt as the others crowded around, wide eyes affixed to the place the two were joined.

“Not in the least,” answered skekOk, head lolling, hind claws flexing pleasurably against nothing. SkekTek growled in agreement, hips rolling hungrily, tongue tip protruding as he panted.

“There's friction,” he reported, “but not enough to be uncomfortable. Quite the opposite.”

There was no holding them back after that.

For a period of time, they forgot that any of them had ever enjoyed doing anything else. They stopped exploring the castle, stopped hanging about on balconies peering out at Thra, hungry for its secrets. Stopped piecing together gaps in their memories from the ancient library the UrSkeks kept. They rutted themselves to exhaustion, only pausing now and then for food or sleep or other essential items. Aughra, the first time she ever walked in on them after they failed to meet her beckoning shouts, just shook her head.

Through it all, skekSo observed. Offered commentary, teasing, even pleasured himself to the sight, but never joined in. The first time skekNa came probing about his hindquarters, erections tellingly flush against his belly, he came as close as he ever had to raking his skin with his teeth, and that was the end of that.

It wasn't as though he was the only one sitting things out. SkekUng, skekEkt, skekAyuk, and skekShod also refrained from partaking. Just what _their_ reasoning was, skekSo didn't know or much care. He knew what his own was, and in his mind, it was not an insensible one.

First bite of the kill. Pick of the litter. If there was one thing he ought not to be expected to do, it was settle.

“My Emperor?” asked skekGra, head low. “Would you care to join skekZok and I? You could do as you would to us, of course, and we'd be honored to have you.”

“...Perhaps another time.”

***

He placed his trust in skekMal's instincts, at first.

It should have been enough. Should have been a small matter for someone like skekMal, who had been in touch with his inner nature from the very first day, and who long after they all got up and started moving about on two legs, never forgot the benefits of walking on all six, and who disappeared for days at a time, but always, always returned with fresh meat. SkekMal who was the first to realize that what fingers could do, a tongue could do even better. If skekMal made the first move, it would mean that skekSo did not have to.

(He didn't know _what_ he wanted, only that it was not to be taken by force, nor something he was made to request, and that he wanted skekMal to be the one to give it to him.)

But the first time skekMal joined them for a typical evening, rather than joining in on this new notion of gripping and pounding away at one another, he merely staked out his favorite spot near the window – where he could smell the forest – and watched the proceedings. When skekLi sidled over to initiate a grooming session, skekMal ignored his hopefully angled tail and nibbled his throat and shoulders in the very picture of politeness, and relocated to his second favorite spot near skekSo before he could attempt anything more direct.

“So you've all figured it out, I see,” he said, without smugness, without derision.

“You have?” skekSo replied.

“Hm. Landstriders do it as well.”

With that, he produced a bit of marrow for them to share – knowing the Emperor's fondness for it – and did not speak of mating again for the rest of the night.

Between the marrow melting on his tongue and the assurance that something he wanted would not be going to skekLi, skekSo took it, accepted it, and named it a small victory.

***

The second evening, skekSo made it a deliberate point to invite the Hunter to sit by his side, and of course he did. They sat conversing amicably, the ruler of the Castle and the most competent among them, about what lay beyond the forest line. SkekMal, was, as always, the embodiment of all things beautiful and untouchable in the last of the light, soft bright blue feathers melding with the deeper, heavier ones of his head and neck the way a sky deepens at the horizon line, and skekSo understood why it was so out of the question to simply _ask_ skekMal to cover him.

But he let his mind color vividly – how it would feel, the Hunter's teeth, breath, and solidness – and waited, warming. Soon enough, skekMal leaned over, whispering in his ear indentation.

“I can smell that you're eager.”

  
“Can you, now?”

“Strong. Intoxicating.”

“Well, far be it from me to question your adroit sense of smell.”

“Would you like me to give you relief?”

“If you insist.”

Rather than simply leaning back, he made it a point to roll over and present himself, tail askew, hips canted. SkekMal fell immediately to work, soft licks curled against his thighs and buttocks and finally, the place where he was soft and hot and wet and had been soft and wet for what seemed such a very long time, and as skekSo sighed his pleasure into the stone floor, he wondered whether it had truly been so easy all this time. And if it had, how silly had he been, fretting, scheming?

Would it be uncomfortable, he wondered? Would skekMal be gentle with him or take him like something from the forest, hard and brutish?

And then he wasn't thinking much of anything, because skekMal's tongue was thrusting within him – his tongue and only his tongue – filling his spine with heat, pushing him past the point of no return, and suddenly, before he could even think of protesting, urging him on to the most sudden, sharp, most disappointing climax of his brief life.

If he'd had ample time to plan for it, he might _at least_ have avoided crying out on principle.

“Good?” skekMal asked, devoid of mockery. SkekSo's mind was not so murky as to shield him from being annoyed.

“...Quite satisfactory.”

***

The third night saw skekOk keen to learn from skekLi's spectacular failure of an example. He made a beeline for skekMal's presence, gray-green feathers fluffed and absurd, rubbing against him and generally making a disgraceful display of himself.

“Hunter,” he began. “It strikes me that you've been running yourself absolutely ragged, bringing us all manner of glorious things to eat, and not _once_ has anyone offered you the pleasure of covering them!”

SkekSo took the opportunity to excuse himself for the night. He didn't ask around as to skekMal's reply, and just to be safe, took a late breakfast, not keen to hear them gossip about it either way.

A milestone, he told himself. To have reached the point where he really, sincerely almost didn't care.

***

They didn't see skekMal again for almost an unum. It would have been easy to read into that the way he had been reading into everything recently, but according to Aughra, it was peak season for hovering trout.

“Your friend the Hunter's been parked by that river bend for days.”

“Hm.”

“Letting them leap straight into his mouth.”

“Of course he would.”

“Why don't you take some initiative? Get out there, start fetching your own food, instead of sweet talking the poor Gelfling into bringing it to you!”

“We have everything to offer the Gelfling.”

“What, things you learned in the UrSkek libraries? Hah! Had better start giving, then, or else learn to feed yourselves!”

That gave him something to think about, and he was deeply and privately grateful for it. It was a _real_ dilemma, gratifyingly heavy in his talons, and it made him feel clever and confident and, yes, apart from the rest. None of this fervor that had taken over them, heads filled with silly thoughts of how to best fill their orifices.

When skekMal at last returned to them, laden with so many fresh and dried fish that he had to work in round trips, skekSo did not feel the desire to snort at him.

SkekAyuk picked through the parcels with shining eyes.

“Alright! No one eat anything else today. I have tremendous plans for these fish.”

SkekAyuk did indeed cook them platters of the stuff, steamed and pan fried and battered in crumbs of the bread the Gelfling brought them. He baked them, stuffed with soft white meat of small crabs from the nearby river system, and incorporated them into a creamy soup that smelled of a beautiful day by the river. And despite the Skeksis falling to snacking within moments of his prior warning, when all was said and done, they left nothing but small bones behind.

“To the Hunter!” toasted skekLach. SkekMal waved a deferring talon.

“To the Gourmand, who made them sing.”

SkekAyuk chuckled. “If you all truly loved me, you'd find me some help in the kitchen.”

Afterwards, they piled into their favorite communal napping chamber – the one with the vast windows, the one the UrSkeks had used for reflections upon the heavens once, but the Skeksis piled with pillows and favored for its ability to soak up the sun. SkekSo took a moment to look about his subjects, sprawled out and content and cared for, before nodding off himself.

When he woke, it was to the soft snores and grunts of sleeping Skeksis, and the lazy dilemma of whether to rise and fill the quiet with some productive duty or to simply roll back over for more sleep. He yawned a cavernous, tooth-filled yawn and was just about to take the latter option when something caught his attention.

The half-hooded eyes of the Hunter, settled quietly on him.

“SkekMal,” he greeted, clearing sleep from his throat with as much poise as he could muster.

“Emperor.”

“Is there a problem?”

“Not especially. Would you like me to groom you?”

Perhaps a month ago it would have been a laden request, but even skekSo had no reason to think anything of it. Preening was a much loved Skeksis pastime, especially when waking up or settling down to sleep. SkekSo wasn't nearly bitter enough to deny it.

“Of course.”

He stretched out comfortably on his front, sun-warmed and slow and satisfied in his nakedness -- Aughra's words were never far from his mind, but Aughra wasn't there, and neither were the Gelfling – and pillowed his chin on his arms, allowing skekMal to creep up behind him.

SkekMal's ferocious looking mouth was gentle as it preened him. It was one of the things he'd always liked about skekMal...skekMal, for all the bloody bodies he carted back for skekAyuk to cut up and roast, was always gentle with him.

“Are you comfortable?”

“Quite, skekMal. Thank you.”

The silence was lingering, but not heavy, and for a time, he thought they might actually talk about whatever this inconvenient business was that had grown up between them, but they didn't. When the Hunter's mouth began to venture low, beyond his shoulders, then the small of his back, he contemplated sleepily what he would do if skekMal decided to lick his slits, whether he would let him.

He never had a chance to. Just then, the cushions rustled, and as he opened his lazy eyes, he saw that skekSil was rising onto his hands, crawling over with head bowed in submission.

“My sire.”

“SkekSil.”

“Permission to groom you as well?”

SkekSo, at most other times, would have denied him. SkekSil was an attractive Skeksis, with soft blue feathers and a gorgeous singing voice, but there was no competing with skekMal the Hunter. His wheedling nature and sycophantic simpering was balm for the ego if you needed it, and just then, skekSo did not. But really, why not? The more beaks on his full, languid senses, the better. Let skekMal share him, for a change.

“Proceed.”

SkekSil needed no second bidding. Humming his delight, he swooped in and fell to the task with a will, nibbling and licking and smoothing over the areas skekMal had yet to dote on and some of the ones he had. Perhaps not as skilled as skekMal, a little too eager, but rather nice just the same. And if skekMal's claws tightened on his hips for just the faintest glimmer of an instant, irritation channeled directly into his skin...well, skekSo could live with that.

He left them to it and closed his eyes once more, allowing himself to loosen beneath the attention and taking a secret, deeply petty enjoyment out of their attempts to navigate around each other. He hoped he didn't fall asleep again, on the off-chance their beaks bumped or some such and it turned into a squabble.

He should have known, should have probably intervened, when he felt skekSil edging close to his hindquarters, and the weight of the air growing heavier as skekMal, with great deliberation that felt like a stone cliff in the middle of a field, never moving to make room for him. When they were suddenly far too close to another. When he felt their erections.

“Sire,” skekSil asked, sweet as syrup. A hand at the base of his tail, resting, presuming nothing. “May I have the honor of covering you?”

And just that fast, skekMal was between them, hovering over skekSo, with his fangs out and his beak parted in a sound that was well past the ineffectual hiss Skeksis gave during altercations. SkekSil, perhaps possessing the sense to realize he'd gotten further with this than he ever should have expected, shrieked and skedaddled, tripping over sleeping bodies in the process. But skekSo's pride had had about all it could take, and he jarred the Hunter clear off him, meeting him beak to beak in a hiss of his own.

The other Skeksis were blinking awake, confused and hazy, just in time to see them staring one another down.

SkekSo was no fool. He knew that if skekMal challenged him physically, he was unlikely to win. He also knew that if skekMal had ever been of a mind to challenge him, he would have long ago. And sure enough, the Hunter dropped his head, though only fractionally.

And then, skekSo did something he would likely not have done had it been anyone else.

“Come, skekMal. You and I. _A word_.”

***

The guest room off the spiral hall was another remnant of bygone days when the UrSkeks had many guests, untended, its thick wooden door insurance against eavesdropping Skeksis. SkekSo latched it, then turned as smooth as satin.

“Now. Do enlighten me as to what that was all about.”

“You know what it was about. SkekSil was going to mount you.”

“And? Need I remind you, skekMal, _I_ choose who I lie with. Not you.”

SkekMal, somewhat to his surprise, exhaled and dropped his eyes in something that was suspiciously close to reproach. “I was...presumptuous.”

“Hm.”

“... _Would_ you have let him mount you?”

“Of course not,” replied skekSo, who owed him no such answer.

“I see.”

“Any further questions on how I conduct myself intimately?”

SkekMal was growing more and more sheepish by the moment, eyes darting, tail twitching. It was a rare sight to be sure, if not dissimilar from the look that came over him when he spied a crawlie along the wall. “My impression was that you weren't interested in being mounted by anyone.”

“...What in the _world_ led you to think that?”

He regretted the sheer inelegance the moment it had left his beak, but skekMal didn't seem to notice. “The others said you've never allowed it. Talons out at anyone who tries. I assumed that you were satisfied with tongues and hands.”

For a moment, skekSo was prepared to believe him utterly. Would have if it were skekEkt or skekVar, or anyone.

But not from skekMal. Not from the Hunter.

“Did you, skekMal? Did you _truly?_ ”

“...The sight of you. The scent. Always squirming, never asking. You ask for nothing, but I was intent on you asking for that.”

SkekSo advanced on him, beak parted. A hint of fang. And this time, skekMal met him eye for eye, and did not falter.

“I do not appreciate being _toyed with_.”

“Of course.”

“I am not some sentimental creature, chasing after your heels.”

“Not at all.”

“I should call upon one of the others to cover me right now. I should have you _watch._ ”

“It would be within your rights.”

He should have, too. SkekUng, maybe, or skekVar, or skekZok. If what lay beneath his tail was such a trophy, he ought to award it to someone who didn't think so little of him as to skulk about the shadows, playing with him like a kill, smelling for his arousal...

“Tell me something, _Hunter_. Have you taken any of the others? Allowed someone under your tail, perhaps?”

SkekMal was watching him very, very closely. “I have not.”

“Then what, might I ask, makes you think you're so very capable of pleasing me?” There was an edge there, one he found he enjoyed having in his mouth. An imperial coldness he tried to refrain from using with the Skeksis, and certainly with the Gelfling, but here and now...

“I've tasted you more than any other Skeksis. Enough to have an idea of what you like.”

A glance toward the door to ensure it was locked. A step toward the ridiculous little beds that had once housed Gelfling and Gruenaks. Back bent, just a single hand resting upon it

“Then do so.”

SkekMal lunged.

Suddenly, skekSo's face was full of fluffy, somewhat dusty bed sheet, and for a baffling instant, he wasn't certain whether he'd been eased onto the bed or pushed. But no, rather, skekMal had hooked an arm around his waist and nibbled on his jaw in exactly the right way, and somewhere between the surprise and the jolt of pleasure, his arms had buckled. One primary hand teased his nipples, a secondary spread his vent, and it was all frighteningly efficient, skekSo had to acknowledge.

“No need to be so cautious with me,” he said as dryly as he could manage, breath catching as skekMal rubbed at that _particular_ spot high on his vent, the one they all liked.

“I've been aching to mount you since the moment I realized I could,” skekMal replied, finger moving in slow circles. “Tell me how you want to be filled, and you will have it.”

SkekSo swallowed hard. “...Carry on touching me like that, and I'm amenable to anything.”

The Hunter's commendable set of erections had fled the scene around the time they'd ceased hissing at one another, but when they made their return, there was no mistaking it for anything else. SkekSo deepened his bow, displaying himself, but skekMal merely hoisted his right leg onto the bed and resumed fondling him, dragging a fingertip through his folds now and again to check the state of his wetness.

Evidently, it still wasn't enough. The hands left him, and skekSo turned just in time to catch a peripheral glimpse of skekMal pulling something from the satchel that hung, buried deep in the feathers of his neck.

“What are you...”

“Just to be safe.”

When those clever fingers returned, they were warm and slick and accompanied by the sounds of skekMal applying the stuff judiciously to himself. Of course the Hunter had made good use of all the time he was spending _not_ fucking someone by preparing for the day he finally did. SkekSo groaned his pleasure _and_ complaint at being gentled so _and_ being teased, all rolled expediently into one.

SkekMal never asked him if he was ready, thank Thra. He paused, tips spreading, and that was enough for skekSo, who rolled his hips just once.

SkekMal shifted, talons braced alongside his head, and...

“ _Oof! Ahh!”_

The most dignified sound it was not. The process was painless, more or less, but the sensation of being stretched in places that had never before been stretched was alarming, to say the least. The only thing that stopped him from whirling around and shoving skekMal bodily off of him was the sensation of skekMal licking and nibbling away at his neck. It was _just_ pleasant enough to compensate for the knowledge that he was being gentled.

And then skekMal began to move. Careful, shallow thrusts.

That should have been enough to tell him whether or not he was enjoying this, but it wasn't.

Much better than blunted talons, but not better than a tongue. _Odd_ , far odder than anything else he'd ever felt, but in a not entirely undesirable way. Mostly, it made him want to move, to wriggle and pant and scrape his talons against the bed.

Had the other Skeksis reacted this way to being penetrated? No, he didn't believe so...when they hadn't been shoving it in dry, they'd all taken to it like a Nebrie to mud. This just made him feel...well, like a Landstrider being mounted. The most appealing thing about it was the fact that it _was_ skekMal, beautiful and dangerous.

But maybe...just possibly...

“Stroke my vent again,” he ordered.

SkekMal did, and there, yes, that was the situation elevating from passable to good. At the very least, it didn't make him feel like one or both of them was failing, failing utterly. SkekMal was giving small hisses and growls, and he was still hard inside him, so there was that marching trek still on the path.

“Here,” said the Hunter after a minute or so of this situation plateauing. “Try lying on your back.”

“Out of the question. I won't have you looking at my face.”

“Alright. Your side, then.”

Maybe it was the lack of old bedsheet in his mouth or the strain off his back, but skekSo at once noted a marked improvement. SkekMal still holding his leg up, skekMal's arms still around him...skekMal still stroking his vent, making him moan, keeping him wet.

SkekMal, pounding slick and hard into him and _oh_ , well now, that one didn't feel half bad at all...

“Would you rather we have done this in front of the others?” SkekSo shook his head, and not just for the thought his awkwardness on display for all to see. “Agreed. I enjoy having you all to myself...”

By Thra, he had a nice voice. Always, but no more so than now, it seemed.

“Tell me,” skekSo said, attempting an equal smoothness. “You said you wanted this. Tell me how you wanted it, planned it..”

“Hmm? Are you accusing me of memorizing them, all the things that made the smell of your arousal fill the air? Implying I might have asked you if you'd wanted me on you before skekSil stepped in?” Almost casually, he put a free hand to work stroking skekSo's erections, and that too was the way he liked it, and he still didn't know whether any of this was correct as such, but he felt it now, a heat in his vent, tendrils of core-deep pleasure. “So tight, so lovely. Always dreamed about how tight you'd be.”

“ _Oh, Thra!”_

SkekMal's hands were working him fast now, fingers slip-sliding on slick, and there was a desperation to it that warned skekMal was not as calm and controlled as he let on, but skekSo's thoughts were on nothing but climax. He didn't care when skekMal stopped talking in lieu of mouthing his throat, licking and biting and disturbing skekSil's (and his own) careful preening work. SkekSo's cocks leaked and twitched, his shoulders trembled, and suddenly, his neck felt so bare he couldn't stand it.

“ _Harder! Bite me! Bite me, now!”_

SkekMal did just that, with only moments to spare before the sputtering warmth of him filled skekSo's senses, filthy, spectacular. His faltering fingers ground down without finesse. It was exactly enough.

Whether it was the right kind of climax couldn't have mattered less. It made him cry out into his own arm. It was new, it was strange, it was skekMal.

And there, on that beautiful day in the middle of the spring ninet, it was the most intrusively luscious thing his vent had ever experienced.

***

“So,” said skekMal as the afternoon lights grew long and liquid, gently licking the places where his teeth had pricked the skin, clumsy in his haste. “Tell me. Have I proven myself capable of pleasing the Emperor?”

SkekSo had sincerely forgotten that that was the angle he'd been playing.

“Don't fish for compliments. It doesn't suit you.”

SkekMal chuckled.

***

When skekSo emerged that afternoon, the smell of UrSkek sung-linen safely stowed away in his memory for the rest of his life, the Skeksis would tease them both, of course. They would rib them gently about the length of their “talk”, their ruffled feathers, the smell of each other that clung to them like a moss to a wall. They would cackle a little at skekSil's absolutely crestfallen expression.

“You all seem to be under the impression,” said skekSo, would say, coolly inspecting his talons, “that the Hunter and I have made even a passing attempt at concealing ourselves.”

And they would give it up, quick as they first took it. 

And skekMal would smile.


	2. Such Sweet Pain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter include rough sex, biting, bleeding, and yes, *consensual* predator/prey dynamics.

***

And so they began...what were, at the time, the tawdriest days of skekSo's brief existence.

They discussed early on – almost immediately as a matter of fact, that night after bathing – the way things would be going forward, because Thra knew he wasn't going to suffer something as demeaning as another _miscommunication._ And so it was quickly settled; no restrictions on what either could or couldn't do with others, if only because skekSo knew it would have been futile. If skekMal was so easy to cage, he wouldn't have wanted him so much.

“It wouldn't do to leave our Emperor _unsatisfied_ ,” skekMal told him the very next morning, as he took him on his back and skekSo hid his face in a pillow and tried not to gasp himself breathless.

It became a routine, the sweetest skekSo had ever known. SkekMal would vanish into the forest once again, often without warning and always without fanfare. SkekSo would put on a very credible show of not thinking about him. The Gelfling would come, be dazzled by the Skeksis' beauty and ever expanding store of knowledge, give them gifts, and leave. SkekMal would return, and skekSo never needed to summon him. SkekMal would find him alone.

Always alone.

And each time, skekSo learned some new and illuminating fact about what he liked; a change in pacing, or a new kind of pressure on his hips. Learned what skekMal liked, which more often than not, seemed to entail giving him whatever he enjoyed as vigorously as he enjoyed it.

Never, never before had anything suited skekSo so fine.

***

“Would you like to do this in front of the others?” skekMal asked one afternoon, as they lay together afterwards, warm and sated. The sun on their bare skin.

“Would _you?_ ”

“I'm asking you.”

SkekSo snorted gently, resting his head more comfortably upon his folded talons. “I see no rush. If ever the initiative strikes us, it does.” _The others don't need to see what I look like when I'm shouting my head off beneath you._ “This arrangement is working out just fine for now.” _They don't need to hear the things you say to me._ “Anyhow, it will be good to keep them guessing over something. They're far too indulged.”

_You're mine._

Because he was. Despite being free to engage in whatever they pleased with the others, he hadn't yet... and much to his secret delight, neither had skekMal.

The Hunter seemed to accept that, running talons along the base of his tail in slow, unassuming silence, until...

“I'd like to teach you to defend yourself.”

“Me specifically?”

“No. Well...yes, initially. I'd like to start with you, and then we can move on to teaching the rest.”

SkekSo stared levelly at him. “You don't think me capable of defending myself?”

“Of course not,” skekMal most likely lied. “But you're the Emperor, the one dealing with the Gelfling day to day, face to face. I'd like to know you're safe.”

“Should I feel unsafe? What have you heard out there, skekMal?”

“No, no, nothing like that. But consider, there's a planet teeming with them and there's sixteen of us. Humor me, Emperor. I would much rather you learned how to fight and never needed to.”

That, skekSo granted, seemed prudent.

They took to the sparring yard in the evening, but before the suns had set – skekSo was no early riser and had equally little interest in sweating it out in midday heat in black feathers. Cool, breezy, enough light to see by, to make out each muscle as skekMal approached him across the soft, upturned soil.

SkekSo's eyes roamed him, in search of the knives he was known to carry and certainly for no other reason. “Where are our weapons?”

“Weapons?”

“That was your preferred method of defending yourself, last I checked.”

SkekMal chuckled – the kind of chuckle that skekSo suspected he could only really give outside of the castle walls. He flashed his talons, all four sets of them; parted his beak, and his teeth gleamed. “Knives are for the joy of it, Emperor. _These_ are the only knives that matter.” SkekSo began to feel just a touch in over his head. “Come. Let me see your knives.”

SkekSo flexed his ungloved talons, felt foolish, and dropped them just as quickly. He opened his mouth, exposing his full set of fangs, polished gleaming white. SkekMal growled approval.

“ _Good._ Just like that. Now...”

SkekMal went easy with him, and started slowly. Showed him how to stand, where to keep his secondary set of arms, how to protect his neck. What muscles to tense, and when. The _correct_ way to flex his talons, flexible, liquid. Always circling him, slowly, looking him over.

“Here,” he urged, reaching out to ease the Emperor's arm in closer. “Like this. Keep your heart safe.” And then, just as he was growing bored with it, certain that he'd picked it up as fast as he'd picked up all the other small, practical lessons leadership had thrown at him... “Want to try coming at me?”

“Do you know, I think I am.”

SkekMal stood before him, back turned, posture down. SkekSo crouched, so calm his feathers lay flat, and lunged...

And exactly that quickly, found himself pinned in the soil, pinioned by skekMal's weight and muscle. SkekMal's breath, close to his ear, “Too slow, _your majesty._ ”

Too sinful to be within the realms of teacher and student, and still lingering hot against his skin as skekMal pulled off his flustered form. SkekSo scrambled up, face burning.

“Shall we try again?”

***

On and on, until the last of the light had failed them. They rinsed the sweat and caking dust from their feathers; took to the hot baths, and skekAyuk brought them cold goblets of wine.

“You progress well,” skekMal told him. SkekSo scowled.

“No need to patronize me.”

“I'm not. For a Skeksis who can't sleep without his silk pillow, you're picking all this up quickly.”

SkekSo, too weary to take umbrage, slid low into the water, allowing it to lap at the first inklings of soreness in his shoulders. “You certainly sound as though you've had no shortage of practical experience out there. Something bigger than Gelfling, I take it.”

“It's true..”

“Tell me about it.”

SkekMal did. Told him a story of the things that lived out near the Crystal Desert; the ones that dwelled underground and have teeth as long as a Skeksis' tail, and only came out after a rain shower. He showed skekSo the fading scar on his arm, but nowhere in his account was anything resembling fear. SkekSo suspected that somewhere, somewhere in that keen mind, lurked a story that skekMal could not tell in a steady voice. Even he knew better than to ask for one.

When he finished, skekMal refilled their goblets.

“Let me give you one piece of advice, Emperor. And if you retain nothing else, retain this. If ever you find yourself in trouble, remember that we merged into the world bristling with fangs and claws. We're made to shed blood, and to hunt is our _right._ By all means, sleep on as many silk pillows as you like, enjoy your hot baths and hot food, because you've earned that too...but never forget that at our core, we are _wild things_. And Thra will always have a place for us out there.”

***

He woke the next morning to too much sun in his eyes and muscles that had, by all indication, been removed, stamped on, and replaced in the course of the night. Every movement was agonizing; to rise and walk without limping, unthinkable.

“Did you stretch before we began?” skekMal asked him, making no effort not to laugh. “Did you use the balm I gave you?”

“I can't move. Summon skekUng and skekTek.”

“You didn't.”

“SkekMal, if you'd like to continue covering me, you _will_ summon skekUng and skekTek.”

An hour later, diagnosed with an imbalance of the humors – skekTek's diagnosis – and a case of latent onset muscle soreness – skekUng's – the Emperor lay prone and medicated, limp and pitiful. Every now and then, listening to the clack of talons outside the door as curious Skeksis came to eavesdrop. When skekMal settled beside him and the room suddenly smelled of velvet, and warm, oiled hands settled on the small of his back, he did not resist.

“...Is that the balm skekUng left? Or the one you were urging upon me?”

“They're practically the same,” skekMal replied. “A recipe from the Podlings. After skekVar, skekUng, and I started training in the sparring yard.”

“...I didn't realize the Podlings were capable of cobbling together anything that smelled pleasant.” Which was not the kindest thing he could say about the Podlings, who were far more skeptical of them than the Gelfling and still brought them practical gifts, but it was true. When skekMal stroked his shoulders, rough palms firm and gentle, his abused muscles cried out at him that this was the first correct thing anyone had done for them all day. “...Truth be told, I thought you would have been gone by now.”

“Hm? Why is that?”

“You're always gone by the next day.”

SkekMal's strokes slowed slightly, but never faltered. “Have I ever left you alone come the next morning? After spending the night alone with you?”

SkekMal thought, but... “No.”

“Well, then.”

SkekSo lost himself in the easy rhythm of his hands as they traveled from the base of his neck to the small of his back; from his secondary shoulders and down to his legs, which were the sorest by far. As they ventured high on thighs, suddenly, the thought of skekMal throwing him to the ground, again and again, pinning them so effortlessly, face down in the dirt – and was astonished at the bolt of pure heat that found him, cutting through the pain like a kitchen knife through warm Nebrie fat.

SkekMal chuckled, frustratingly knowing.

“Feeling better already?”

“...You talk too much.”

SkekMal added another dollop of balm to his finger.

***

SkekMal stayed with him the rest of the day, and through the next morning. Departed for the forest the next afternoon, after confirming the Emperor could stand without buckling and falling on his beak, after a last slow, careful coupling that left him warm and content. Wanting to be held, and receiving it.

And thinking.

Satisfied. More or less.

How gentle skekMal had been with him. How absolutely, unfailingly careful.

How painful it would have been if he had not.

***

The long, slow crawl between the Hunter's visits...oh, how very long they were.

SkekAyuk was increasingly adamant that he needed help in the kitchen or the quality of their meals was going to suffer. SkekEkt and skekShod were in agreement that they needed better storage for their work materials and the care and keeping of the Gelflings' offerings of treasure, respectively. SkekOk wanted to know if there was a way to get the Gelfling to stop asking about the UrSkeks in such a way that didn't offend them so much they stopped bringing said treasure, and skekNa thought they needed an excuse as to why they couldn't farm the abundantly fertile land surrounding the Castle themselves.

(They _couldn't_ , of course. SkekSo thought he had made that clear to all involved.)

“Perhaps we don't need to worry about that quite yet,” skekTek proposed. "Perhaps, if they absolutely get persistent about it, we can have the Hunter teach us to hunt and forage.” And then, at their downfallen expressions, “We could do it in shifts.”

“I'm sure he would be willing to,” skekLach took up. “If the Emperor asked him.”

They'd never been _forbidden_ from speaking freely to him but the room still fell rather quiet. SkekSo cocked a brow.

“I beg your _pardon,_ skekLach?”

SkekLach waved a talon. “You know what I mean. It isn't a slight. You've been rubbing your temples less than these days.”

“It's true, sire,” said skekEkt, a little emboldened. “You're our Emperor, after all. It's good to see you happy.”

SkekSo looked about them, all nodding along, so eager to lean into the comforting embrace of what someone else thought. He had no reason to believe them anything but sincere...and for all they drove him to want to dash his head into the wall, he had to admit, life would be far worse without their adoration.

“If it becomes an absolute necessity, I'll have a word with the Hunter. However, turning matters away from my intensely private life, I believe you had something to propose, skekGra. And this time, I implore you, spare us the musical version.”

***

In his dreams, the forest was all around him.

The last of the sunlight, dappled through trees. Crouched low to the ground, jaws parted to catch the smell of a root-nibbler on the roof of his mouth...raw root nibbler, something he only ever smelled strung up in a brace of 12 a time and delivered to skekAyuk to be stuffed with bread and herbs and bits of roast offal.

Flat out, all six limbs slapping hard into the terrain. The flash of its long pale legs, white flags against the growing dark.

He reached for it and _flash_ , skipping elsewhere in time, as dreams were wont to do. SkekMal, his blues blackened by shadow, circling him and sniffing the air. SkekSo hissing, feathers flared as wide as he could make them, and ready to fight to the death. If in this life there was a castle, a title, a Crystal, he entertained no thought of any of it it.

SkekMal lunging, and skekSo meeting him midway, the two clashing like strips of oiled dark leather cracking against the air, tangling and throwing blood and feathers.

Suddenly, the ground against his belly and skekMal's jaws about his neck. Tail shoved aside. Screaming, but not in pain, as the other Skeksis took him violently.

He woke wetter than he'd ever been in his life.

As he blunted his shaking claws and thrust all three up inside himself, he wished dearly he could take apart the inner workings of his own head, and spread it out before him the way skekTek was known to lay out his instruments.

He imagined it would be enlightening.

***

Six days later, skekMal made his usual rounds back to the castle. No exotic meats this time, but plenty of furs for skekEkt's collection, plenty of glistening scales for skekShod's, apparently all come from the same animal. SkekSo couldn't wait for them to clear out fast enough.

“I need you to be rough with me.”

SkekMal, who was accustomed to at least being allowed a goblet of wine before they got down to it, blinked. “Come again?”

“The sparring yard. Or anywhere, it doesn't matter to me. I'm asking you to throw me down and treat me savagely.”

SkekMal glanced over his shoulder, then back. “Blunter than your usual approach, I'll admit.”

“I'm simply avoiding history repeating itself. If you're not amenable to the idea, by all means, tell me and I'll...” Do what? Breed his own tail? Ask skekTek to build him a device that bred him while holding him down? “Make it my own problem.”

SkekMal uttered a low, low purr – the kind that informed skekSo this was all about to head in a very amenable direction. After casting a second precautionary glance around – a sensible idea, since skekSo likely would not have – he took a step forward, then another, backing skekSo into the wall.“Do you want that, Emperor? Want me to rough you up?”

SkekSo gulped around a throat that was suddenly rather dry. “I'm asking, aren't I?”

A single talon beneath his chin. Long and sharp, and stained with the dirt of a thousand places ventured, a thousand things touched. “Want me to bruise you? Scatter a few of your feathers? Want me to make you scream?”

“... _Yes._ ”

SkekMal nipped softly on the curvature of his jaw, displacing a single soft facial feather. The promise to displace more.

“Then tell me when.”

***

They met in the sparring yard as the suns began their descent; after any Skeksis out for walks would have returned, fearing the dark, after they'd made plans to settle in with books and tea. SkekMal circled his naked form with beak parted to smell the air; now and then the light caught his eyes, rendering them frightening, pupilless pans of shining white. Even skekSo's awareness that academically, his own did the same did nothing to lessen the feeling of being a small, misbehaving thing who had stayed out too late and been caught by a monster.

“Again, Emperor...are you certain you want to do this?” skekMal said.

SkekSo, commendably, managed to keep his voice even. “Do I have a choice?”

“No.”

They'd arranged a way to end this little game without hesitation or question. This was not it.

SkekSo waited until the gate leading back to the castle, to fires and robes and safety, was in front of him. And then he made a run for it.

SkekMal let him make it about halfway, and then he was upon him. SkekSo turned to make a fight of it, and to his credit, did so; as the two crashed to the ground, throwing talons and dirt, he felt the satisfying tear of feathers coming loose as he tore at skekMal's shoulder. Anything, anything to keep from being thrown onto his front, because once he'd done that, it was all over.

His heart sank, then galloped eagerly as skekMal finally succeeded in capturing his slender wrists, transferring them effortlessly to the grip of a single hand. Secondary limbs scrabbled and pushed and clawed at skekMal's hard waist, then sang with pain as they found themselves wrenched and held in kind. Something warm was running, and skekSo had no way of knowing whether it was sweat or blood, his own or the Hunter's.

Down, hard and cruel, beak grinding into the dirt until he spat at it. SkekMal nudged and pushed his hindquarters and skekSo slammed his tail between his legs like his life depended on it, winding it around his leg for good measure. SkekMal bit him on the shoulder, and not politely, but there was a sickly amused chuckle to his voice as he freed a hand and wriggled it beneath skekSo's tail; beneath the soft, reptilian flesh where no feathers covered.

He was already wet, so wet, but skekMal toyed with him as though he were not; rubbing him exactly the way he liked it, high on his vent and just beyond his folds, but not fully entering him. “There we are...there we are...”

SkekSo pulled his head up. His head was swimming, and when he spoke, it sounded distant and hollow. _“Savage...”_

Without effort, his tail was pulled and held away, exposing him to the night air. Without warning, skekMal's tips sank into his slickness, and he could do nothing but groan.

It was exquisite and it was terrible. The Hunter forwent his usual favorite routine of starting out slow and seeing how long it took skekSo to throw himself back and demand more, forewent gentleness, taking him hard and fast. He was slick enough that his body took it, took it and loved it, but the weight on his shoulders was painful, he was filthy, and whenever he stuttered into a groan, he tasted dirt. Never in his life had he been treated so far from what he deserved.

Without ever faltering from his stroke, skekMal wrapped a hand around his throat.

“If I let go of your wrists,” skekMal asked calmly, “are you going to behave yourself?”

SkekSo didn't answer at first, overwhelmed and weighing whatever skekMal had planned with the tempting possibility of punishment. But at last, he gave a single nod, and skekMal released his wrists, though not his neck.

“Good.”

No sooner had he shifted into a somewhat more comfortable position than skekMal's secondary talons sank into his hips, hard enough to make him cry out (though as he'd discover later, not as deep as they felt.) This time, he knew the ensuing trickle of warmth was his own.

“Like that, don't you?” skekMal asked him. And it was true. His erections jumped with each fresh stab of pain, something they'd never done before, and dripped each time skekMal's gripped tightened about his throat, talons tickling dangerously. “Like being made to take it, like it when I rip into you...”

If he opened his eyes all the way, he could just make out the orange glow from the end of the yard, beckoning him back to the real world.

“ _Nnn_...”

“Come on, now. Tell me.”

SkekSo whirled around as best he could.

“If you're going to hurt me, _hurt me._ And stop _wasting my time._ ”

SkekMal faltered from his stroke.

It was only for a moment. In a moment, he would grin his usual sharp grin, and dig his talons in harder. His teeth would clasp around the Emperor's throat and he would do things with his hips that would have him shrieking.

But skekSo's chest roared with pride, and would for some time.

“ _As your majesty wishes.”_

***

SkekUng, ever the consummate medical professional, grumbled only slightly – 10 or so minutes – upon being roused from his comfortable bed and confronted with the fact that he had to whip up fresh medicinal salve. He soaked the bandages, dismissed the need for stitches, and accepted his patients' assurances that they were uninjured below the waist.

“If you're going to run each other through skekAyuk's meat grinder, at least do it during the daylight hours. You're not hiding anything. Everyone knows.”

“Do your job, Physician,” replied skekSo, hoarse, but thick with content.

And skekUng, thankfully, did not comment on skekMal's gentle preens when his back was turned, or the way they leaned heavily into one another's sides.


	3. Hunt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning for animal death in this one.

Tagging along on the hunt had been skekSo's idea.

It was nothing short of vital, he insisted. The food crisis was no closer to being solved than it was four unum ago, the Gelfling couldn't be counted on to feed them forever, nor skekMal to hunt for them. If they couldn't even fill their own beaks, how could they hope to be seen as dependable custodians of the Crystal?

(SkekMal had asked, with no small trace of amusement, why he didn't simply seek out the Gelfling farmers for a lesson in working the land. SkekSo had reminded him _for the last time_ that that was not an option.)

The other Skeksis had responded predictably, with an inordinate amount of fuss and noise.

“Our Emperor,” wailed skekEkt, with all his usual strategic loudness. “Off into the ruthless wilds!”

“Sire,” took up skekOk, “We implore you to reconsider! Thra forbid, if something terrible befalls you out there, whatever will happen to us? Where ever will we turn?”

“What if the Gelfing turn on us?" added skekNa. "What if the castle falls under attack?”

“Sire is deeply beloved,” said skekSil. “When have Skeksis been without Emperor? What are Skeksis, if not standing about Emperor?”

“For pity's sake, I am leaving for all of _a day_. Two at the very most.” He glared at them, because as much of a balm to the ego as their simpering could be, by Thra, there had to be a line somewhere. “SkekAyuk will continue to feed you. If you are injured, seek out skekUng. If you have a concern, bring it to skekZok, and if it truly cannot wait, blow the new horn. That is, after all, the purpose of the Hunter's horn.”

That seemed to pacify them, if not quiet their whimpers entirely. When night fell, as they all settled into their customary communal sleeping arrangement, they wound around him, nuzzling beneath his chin and preening him as though it were the end of the world. They all vowed to be up before the suns to see him off in grand and glorious fashion, like he deserved, and that they would watch him until he could no longer be seen – and yes, perhaps even a little longer!

When skekMal shook his shoulder, he found that they were still snoring loudly all around him.

In all the time it took him to dress and slip away, not a single one awoke.

***

They traveled light, as skekMal had insisted. Just a traveling cloak and staff to start with, and one small knife. A canteen of water, but no food.

The morning was cool and still without being oppressively chilly, and the sound of the birds striking up their dawn chorus a pleasant enough reminder that the world was as it should have been. SkekMal had said they would have no need of lamp nor torch, and indeed, skekSo's breath caught with the small wonder of it all as this eyes adjusted, the ink black giving way to the realization that he could see everything in his path.

“Didn't I tell you?” skekMal commented lightly. “We were made to be here. We were made for _this._ ”

SkekSo found himself taking it all in, to the point of forgetting to look back at the sight of the castle's silhouette growing smaller behind them. The babble of the rivers and inlets, broken by the splash of started things jumping in the water. A thousand warm scents and wet, pungent odors, jostling for position at the forefront of his brain, heavy with stories to be told. The blinking out of stars, one by one by one.

As they crossed the treeline, the catch of his heartbeat as he made out the shape of something in the dark, something that startled and scattered, but for just a moment that would remain with him all his life, could not see him.

“It's a lawless place,” he confessed. “But I can see why you enjoy it.”

They walked the dirt path worn hard and smooth by the feet of generations of Gelfling en route to see the UrSkeks. Now and then the forest would give way to a Gelfling farm, and as the Brothers bathed the world in blue, then gray, then orange light, they found themselves passing by the occasional Gelfling farmer beginning work for the day. SkekSo had held some concern over this, but most merely waved from a distance, and only one was near enough to speak to them at all.

“Come in for a bite of breakfast, my Guardians?” SkekMal waved him off.

It was pleasant like that, ambling side by side, the strangeness of being so far from home buffered by skekMal's presence. From time to time, the Hunter would stop to point out something that warranted his attention; tracks, sign, the smell of blood. How to gauge the freshness of them all.

Eventually, they came to a place where the river forded the path, and skekMal took a hard turn off the beaten road in favor of leading them into the thick of the forest. SkekSo took this to mean that they were very near to where they would be hunting and built up his anticipation accordingly.

An hour of ducking branches and leaping over fallen trees later, skekSo began to find the old growths covered in moss and the gnarled branches shaped like the heads of Skeksis less charming. Two hours later, he began to be out of breath.

Three, he began to entertain the first inklings that this entire venture was a profoundly idiotic idea.

“We'll rest here for a moment,” skekMal said at last, and skekSo took a dignified seat in the loam that was not at all synonymous with his legs simply giving out beneath him.

“I suppose you're going to give me some rationale or other as to why we couldn't simply hunt near the castle.”

SkekMal pulled the canteen from his waistband, passed it over, and allowed skekSo to guzzle from it first. “Trust me, I'm doing you a mercy. The game near the castle is balkish. Too used to everyone coming and going, too used to me...it would be a cruel joke, sending you out for your first hunt in those woods.”

SkekSo huffed, feeling condescended. “I didn't become Emperor to favor the path of least resistance.”

“My apologies. Next time I take you out, we can hunt near the castle. We can even do it on the way back if that suits you.”

SkekSo hesitated. His first course of action upon sighting the castle, he had decided, was going to be rushing it as fast as his pride allowed and making a beeline for the hot baths.

“It does. It very much does.”

***

Before the Brothers had reached their zenith, two things had become apparent.

The first was that skekMal had, in fact, led them to a veritable cornucopia of game. Moreover, it was game that was unfamiliar with Skeksis. No matter how many fat, scurrying things skekSo seized at and missed, it never seemed long before the leaves took to rustling again, and though skekSo had anticipated a modest pile of dead wildlife by mid-morning, couldn't be too put off by his own patchy progress.

The second was that he was beginning to be terribly, terribly hungry.

“I would think that hunger made for a poor hunter,” he remarked. “Isn't that what you're always talking about? This predator or that one, too old or weak to hunt, so it takes to attacking Podlings?”

“ _Starvation_ makes for a desperate predator,” skekMal corrected. “Hunger is just a fact of life. It'll sharpen your senses.”

SkekSo had no way of ascertaining whether that were true or if skekMal telling him it was made him believe it, but it was true that the maelstrom of scents that had been bombarding his senses all day were taking on a sharper focus the hungrier he got. Never had he thought he would find himself announcing the smell of hair or bodily fluids, let alone been so proud to have sniffed it out before skekMal. As the hours ticked by and the dirt muted his feathers, so did the sense of rightness...the certainty that he could would do this, head lifted to the air.

(He was not quite so ravenous that he failed to notice the Hunter stealing long, appreciative glances.)

And then, like a blessing from the blue...

“Kiltspring,” he said. SkekMal used to bring them to the castle in the early days, before branching out onto more substantial game. All haunches, all dark meat. Excellent flavor. “...Something else, too. Not blood.”

SkekMal lifted his head to the wind, parting his jaws to allow the scent to bathe the roof of his mouth. “Stress. Fear. Sharp, old piss, like it hasn't been cleaning itself...There may be a little blood. Do you want to try for it?”

SkekSo was already off, treading lightly, every hungry fiber in him insisting that this was a stroke of good fortune he had to find, and to be quick about it, before someone else did. Suddenly, the clumsiness of his hind claws seemed too much of a burden to tolerate, and without even thinking, he dropped onto all six limbs, loping along with his beak opened, muscles ready, and always, always scenting.

He found it near a coppice of spiraling trees he did not know the name of; a young adult Kiltspring, clearly nursing a broken leg as it hobbled from bush to bush, nibbling tender leaves, short face full of blunt teeth and bearing its agony with the quiet apathy of a prey animal. Even skekSo, who relished extra oils after a bath and had never missed lunch, knew how miraculous it was that it had survived this long at all.

_Stay low._

_Stay downwind._

SkekSo's world filled with the creature, and all the forest around it. Mapping it all out, so that no matter which direction it ran, he would be prepared.

_Keep your muscles loose._

Mind the front claws. It couldn't kick with one leg, couldn't get those hind claws into his belly, but those deceptively small little front hooks were just as sharp as they dragged mouthfuls of foliage into its hungry mouth, and if he wasn't cautious, he would catch one in the throat or eye.

_Feel Thra beneath your talons._

He watched it sigh. A small, secret, private sigh.

Gingerly, slowly, it bedded itself down at the base of a tree.

And skekSo let go.

_Where your eyes go, so go your talons._

Even gravely injured, the kiltspring was young and healthy, and did not want to die. In the blink of an eye it had leapt upright, taking off with its bad leg cradled in the air, its desperate flight pointed in the direction of the river. But skekSo pivoted, secondary arms thrust out to steady him, tail arced to balance him, all without giving any of it a conscious thought.

_We were made for this._

***

...It took a while to die, he would think later.

Even with his jaws around its throat, it took such a very long time to die.

***

They ate the meat raw and warm. SkekMal hung back at first, letting skekSo fight the hide and sinew with his teeth until he had created such sufficient space as to plunge his entire head into the kill. Only after several healthy mouthfuls did skekSo notice this, and only upon being summoned did skekMal approach on all sixes, head as close to bowed as it had ever been, and lick the blood from beneath his Emperor's chin.

It had been skekSo's intention that whatever they killed would last them some time, but between them, they polished off every last morsel. After cracking the last bone of skekSo's triumph, they lay grooming one another in the sun, stretched out and saying little. At some point, skekSo closed his eyes, and when he opened them, the late afternoon light was a heady orange and skekMal was sifting through the scraps of the carcass.

“I thought you said you had enough Kiltspring hides to last an eternity,” skekSo said with a yawn. “I thought you said they were worthless.”

“They are,” skekMal replied. “But I like to keep the scent glands. Good for hiding traps.”

“I see.”

“If you'd like to go and get some wood together, I can make us some tea.”

“Hm? Are we through playing wild animals, then?”

“I like tea.”

That was an argument skekSo could easily concur with, so he rose up, shook himself off, and went to do just that, standing on two legs like a civilized creature. Which he was, mind, and always would be...and just the same, glancing back at those bits of bone and fluff gave him an impossible rush of pride. As far as he was concerned, he was now capable of feeding every last Skeksis in the castle on his own should the need ever arise. When he returned skekMal had finished digging through organs and laid out an assortment of what looked like stinging weeds, but smelled fragrant enough.

“I do hope you washed your hands before handling those.”

“They're going into the boiling water.”

“ _SkekMal._ ”

“Yes, I washed my hands.”

SkekSo deposited the wood in a rough pile, and devoid of further chores, settled into a comfortable stretch and a roll in the grass, talons curling in the air and....oh yes, _right_ there. Itch scratched, fragrant grass, warm sun on his bare belly full of food _he'd_ provided for himself and skekMal. Life was really and truly kind at times.

He was just envisioning how superb skekMal's tea would taste when a single, questioning lick was placed on his (admittedly, rather exposed) vent.

SkekSo raised his head with an inquisitive hum and a raised brow. SkekMal's feathered blue face peered back at him from between his legs, looking at him as though it should have all been obvious.

“I am filthy,” skekSo informed him plainly. “Caked with dirt and sweat.”

“I know.”

“I knew skekNa had a love for things of that nature. Didn't know it applied to you as well.”

“It doesn't,” skekMal replied.

“It is entirely possible I am carrying ticks.”

“I know,” purred skekMal, and licked him again. On the inner thigh this time...not taking, but requesting. His eyes turned up to skekSo's face, and in them the Emperor glimpsed something more than a little imploring.

SkekSo chuckled, and pushed down on the top of his head.

SkekMal's tongue work was, as always, sublime, and yet – paradoxically – there was just something about him when his normally precise finesse was compromised. Spreading his vent, the Hunter worked him fast and sloppy, wet and loud, like he'd been adrift in the Crystal sea for an unum and skekSo was an accumulated pool of rain in a dip in the rocks. Like the fact that he'd been out tramping through the dust and undergrowth in the blazing sun were some magic missing ingredient on top of a dish he already very assuredly liked.

He couldn't seem to get deep enough, and the deeper he went, the deeper the bow in skekSo's back.

“Mmm... _clever_ Hunter...so talented...so _good_ to me.”

SkekMal simply growled into his head, talons pricking as he pulled skekSo's hips closer to his mouth. And for a while, skekSo was supremely pleased to simply bask in it all...the soft grass against his back, skekMal's softer tongue; the thrill of the open air on his naked skin, and the intoxication of his own excellence.

When skekMal's tongue began to fly harder and faster in a way he recognized all too well as the final touch meant to send him over the edge, the temptation to let it was a real one.

Instead, he pushed skekMal's head away.

The Hunter arched his brow, but skekSo merely pushed him onto his back, delighted at the ease with which he went down. It wasn't like skekMal to give up his belly without at least a token grumble, and there it was, pale blue, hard as a stone. SkekSo ran his palm across it – feathers tapering away below the shoulders like they did on all of them, becoming lighter and softer before eventually becoming nonexistent – and over the place where skekMal had smeared precum.

(Thra, the things he missed out on by never having seen skekMal's cocks in the full sunlight.)

When he reached for them, the Hunter's knees twitched inward, only relaxing as long, violet fingers took hold of his erections, and it may have been that he assumed skekSo would never notice, but he did, and he wondered whether skekMal had assumed he was reaching for his vent, and what it might have meant that he had covered it.

But the Emperor was not reaching for his vent, not today, choosing to take his lovely, curving erections in hand and rock his hips wetly over the leaking tips. When skekMal growled and twitched upwards, skekSo moved with him, nonchalantly avoiding any chance at penetration.

SkekMal narrowed his eyes in a way that on any other day would have seemed dangerous. “Trying to get me to roll you over and claim you, majesty?”

“Not today,” skekSo replied, circling a talon around the slits, testing the wetness against the gathering sensation of his own, hot and slick between his thighs. “Later, perhaps, or perhaps not. Tell me though, skekMal, do you _want_ to claim me?”

“Of course I do.”

“Interesting! Do tell me more.”

“Of course I want to claim you. I want to pin you to the ground, mount your haunches and breed your vent until you're limp and panting. I want to drive you into the grass and spill inside you, and bite your throat, and when you release, I want to lick it from your skin.”

“Mm, _much_ better.” And with that, skekSo lowered himself smoothly onto skekMal's members, smooth as glass, their growls of pleasure rolling over and over and into one another, and then out again. Talons on skekMal's chest to brace as he rose and fell at his own prescribed pace, no more than he liked it, and no less. SkekMal's hands flew to his hips, tightened there as if to manipulate him, then fell away. “Good. _Excellent_...”

He thought, as he rocked on his Hunter's erections, that he had been rather unfair to the world outside of the Castle. Never would he have imagined that anything could feel so isolated, and yet so voyeuristic all at once. Never could he have imagined how correct it would seem to have blood on his fangs and dirt beneath his talons, and to have skekMal beneath his tail, with nothing between them and the eyes of the world but the distance they'd managed to hike in.

And maybe he _would_ have skekMal claim him later on, he thought as he ground his hips downward loud enough to make himself moan. Mount him and take him without politics or trappings, like a Fizzgig knotted inside of another. Anything, he concluded, anything at all. Just so long as that beautiful body was pressed to his, and those green eyes continued to _look at him like that._

All the while, skekMal said nothing. Leaving skekSo to wonder, as he always did, just how he existed as seen through those eyes.

He never asked, of course. But when he leaned in to lick skekMal's beak, the Hunter butted his head beneath his jaw, and purred a deep, new, rumbling purr.

***

“I hope the Gelfling never give you a reason to go hunting,” skekMal gasped into his ear that night, as they coupled again beneath the stars.“I hope that no one ever sees you hunt but me.”

Completely breathless, and apropos of nothing.

SkekSo pulled him closer with his tail, moaned into the grass, and remembered it always.


	4. Pet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretty graphic petplay in this one, so might want to turn back if that's not your thing.

SkekSo never would have thought himself the type to become a pet owner.

Pets were dirty and smelled, for one thing. For another, they were a demand on one's time and energies, and heavens knew he had enough of those in his life already. He couldn't imagine having the time to set a solobe in the sun and forget about it, let alone keep up with such a high maintenance specimen as the one he had ultimately had found himself with.

And yet, even the Emperor required some sort of companionship. Few knew it, but it really was an exceptionally lonely life, the life he led. There existed so few he could rely on, or find comfort in. Aughra's loyalty, the loyalty to all of Thra, was to the Crystal...if it came down to the Crystal or feeding him to the Gobbles, he knew there would be no contest. The Skeksis, for all their cooing and preening and jostling to be the one to press up close beside him when they all settled down to sleep as a group...he was under no illusions that they would continue to do so if ever it cost them something.

  
And skekMal? SkekMal could not always be counted on to be around, or anywhere for that matter, and would not be skekMal if he could.

Yes, there was little doubt about it. Taking a pet was by far the best thing he'd ever done for himself.

“Isn't that correct, my clever one?”

SkekSo's pet lifted his feathered head from the Emperor's stomach. The ornamental harness – cured Nurloc leather, studded silver on the brow – lay lightly about the curve of his beak, a reminder of his newly domesticated status and how much training they had yet to go. SkekSo had no expectations that he would ever fully succeed in breaking the forest out of this one, but if that were the intention, he would have settled for a Sidetic. When skekSo reached for him, he received a lick on the wrist rather than a growl or a snap, and scratched his charge beneath the chin.

“Good pet. So _well-mannered_ you are now.” The tail gave a thump, and skekSo continued to card his fingers through blue feathers reflectively. “Hardly recognizable as that feral, tangle ridden beast that used to skulk around the treeline. Do you recall?”

The pet didn't respond, because it was a pet, but skekSo remembered. He remembered the first day he encountered it, walking by the streams and inlets in the evening light...the silhouette hunched to drink, and the eyeshine as it had looked up at him. The rolling muscles, moving ever closer in the shadows.

“I suppose I can tell you now that I _did,_ just for a moment, consider that that may be the end of me. Until... _well._ ”

Until it lay a single lick upon his bare thigh.

The Emperor smiled, warming at the memory. “I do wonder if the same holds true for all wild and vicious things? Imagine, alerting Spriton farmers that all their trouble with Peeper Beetles are over, provided they're willing to part their knees for them.”

He thought it was rather clever; the pet just mouthed his knuckles.

SkekSo continued to stroke his beast with one primary hand, sipping wine with the other thumbing through the recollection of that night and those that had followed like a well-loved book taken by the fire. No Skeksis had ever done such a thing (not unless skekSa was getting up to deeds she kept close to her chest, out there in the wild) and he reveled in the very idea of it, his own perversity. _His_ pet was as beautiful and dangerous as it was rare, entirely befitting of him, and if he was going to be taken like an animal, by an animal, he could think of no creature more suited to do the job.

When their arrangement had first begun, it was often the pet that initiated, panting and cajoling until skekSo realized he was erect. Now it was skekSo whose blood warmed simply from being near him, and begging the question just a tad of who, in the end, had managed to train who.

Setting aside the wine glass, he took a quick mental stock of his schedule for the day...whether he had time to set aside, and more importantly, whether he stood any chance of being disturbed. But he did not, and his faithful pet blinked at him as the stroking ceased, and a close grip on the halter was taken. As skekSo shifted back upon the pillows, parting his vent with his talons.

Already he was wet, and already his pet's eyes were dilating with interest as he huffed the air. He attempted to bend down, no doubt to sniff and lick at the Emperor's thighs, pulling insistently at the halter. But skekSo wanted to attach an order to the behavior, to establish it and put a leash around it, and held fast.

“Pet. _Stay_.”

And, somewhat to his surprise, the pet stayed. Not happily, but stay he did, eyes blowing darker with interest as skekSo toyed with his slit, playing idly with his folds...traversing with a lone fingertip the start of his deeper inner passageways. Lingeringly, he considered his pet's level of education, and how far he could be pushed without tackling skekSo to the ground, and whether it was worth sacrificing weeks of careful training in the event that he did...but they had been diligent in their efforts, both of them, and at last, he raised a hand to his pet's mouth. Much to his approval, the pet remained where it was, tongue swiping the sheen from the paler violet of skekSo's fingertip, but making no further move to lunge for the source of its treat.

“Very, _very_ good pet. That's precisely how you do it. You stay until you're commanded.”

The pet, to its credit, didn't whine, nor whimper, like a common wretched thing would have. It licked his finger, then his knuckles, until not even the taste of him surely remained. And skekSo, beneficent owner that he was, at long last took pity on both it and himself.

“Pet. Lick.”

The grip on the harness went up. The pet's head went down.

The first touch of tongue upon the soft, delicate skin of his thighs was welcome enough to have him tipping back his head and sighing aloud.

It didn't take the time to tease him. SkekSo liked to be teased when it was done properly, and everybody in his life knew it, and so they did it often, but rarely well. SkekMal would have toyed with him correctly, but the pet simply fell upon him in a brusque, hungry, yet almost transactional fashion, the swipes of its tongue imprecise and loud and firm enough to dip up into him with every pass.

“Mm...good creature...”

He kept himself spread open because if he didn't, no one else would have. The pet didn't know enough to hold his hips or play with his nipples, nor to glean any insight on what he liked from his twitches and gasps; whether its tongue would move over him in a way that was merely pleasurable or enough to make his eyes roll back was a matter of chance, and there was something about that which thrilled skekSo in a way he couldn't entirely put his finger to. The thought flashed across his mind, quite out of the blue but amusing just the same, what skekSil and his overcompensating tongue flourishes would think if he could see him moaning for an animal now.

The pet's beak was pressed up against him tight, focused little twitches of tail winding against the bed as it worked. SkekSo scratched it behind the head, all encouragement.

“Mm...excellent pet...so talented...so _wonderful_...” His suitor answered incidentally by licking faster, short flicks alternating with long laps, all in an attempt to lick up his slickness as fast as he could produce it. SkekSo's head lolled, his thighs beginning to tremble, and quite involuntarily, his voice following suit. “Exactly like that...oh Thra, like that, don't _stop_...”

It would have happily licked him until he shook with climax, and had before, and whatever skekSo's plans had been when he commanded it to pleasure him, it was a tempting proposition to disregard them and just let it. Indeed, shoving its head away was a small torture, his thighs soaking wet with slick and saliva and the strength as it fought his grip to get back between his legs as convincing an argument as ever he'd heard.

If he hadn't happened to catch a glimpse of its erections standing against its belly, he might have allowed it.

“Hush now, hush,” he half soothed, half commanded, pushing the creature's thigh to the side to better expose its sparsely feathered genital region. “Mind your manners. Have I ever left you bereft? Of course not.” He curled his talons around its erections, squeezing until three drops of blood-warm pre-ejaculate fell upon his wrist. A satisfied hum as he reached into the side table to take up a handful of oil, slicking it generously over each phallus in kind.

That it was a pet, and couldn't understand him, seemed no reason not to speak as he stroked it.

“Someday...when we've got you properly trained up...I _might_ just put my mouth on you.” The creature uttered a very low growl, purely coincidentally, of course...purely in response to his hand. “Oh, yes. Don't misunderstand now, I've no interest in turning you into a Podling's pampered little lap pet. However, it will hardly castrate you to remember who is your master, and who holds your leash. When you're willing to let me roll you over without making a fuss, to expose your underside to me, _then_ we can see about allowing you to spill in my mouth. Good pets get to enjoy such treats.”

The creature was panting now, thrusting wetly into his fist, and skekSo's head suddenly swam with the thought of doing exactly as he described in full view of the other Skeksis. That he had precisely zero intention of ever actually _doing so_ was irrelevant. He was hard and obscenely wet, and the most debased and shameful things one could do danced across his mind's eye like a banquet.

“Stay, pet. _Stay._ ”

It was, yet again, a testament to their extensive training together that the creature did. Even as skekSo removed his hand...as he positioned himself on his knees, a pillow beneath his hips and his tail arched invitingly in the air. As skekSo spread his legs, dripping vent scant inches from where the pet sat, no Fizzgig with a tidbit of snoutling on its nose had ever shown such restraint.

“Pet,” skekSo breathed. “ _Mount._ ”

Like quicksilver the creature covered him, the weight forcing him deeper against the mattress. Two sets of claws braced on skekSo's waist, the others on his hips, and erections searching, sliding slick and hot through the mess that pooled around his opening. It was a horrendous tease for anyone to have to bear, and skekSo deepened his bow in an effort to assist his pet. Once, twice, again, the tips caught on his entrance, but before he could reach back to guide them in, the pet hit his mark, sinking in to the hilt with such haste that--

“ _Ah...ah!”_ skekSo cried out into the silk of the pillow, straddling the line between discomfort and delight.

His pet wasted no time, slamming into him hard and fast and with scant regard for his comfort, but compared to the first time he presented himself – on the banks of the stream with mud coating his palms and knees, barely slick enough, breath rattling each time the beast pounded inwards – this was gentle handling. Childling's play.

“ _Oh Thra...oh dear Thra..._ ”

Hot, wet breath on his shoulder. The back of his neck.

As wet as he felt, and yet, and yet...

Bite down on the pillow. Prepared well enough, not exactly pain, but just the same, so much, so _much..._ and still, his needy vent, his pathetic body taking it, accommodating it, spreading for it, and demanding more.

_You can take it. You **can** take it. You are Emperor, you deserve to tame the wildest of beasts, to have it lay in your lap, and you deserve this because you can take it. _

Breathe deep. Let the sheets withstand the crushing vice of his grip, and let them take the brunt of his weakness.

Relax, relax, _relax..._

Relax.

_You can take being slammed beneath the tail._

Only when he was entirely certain that he would not whimper did he dare to raise his beak. The slap of flesh on flesh was audible, and would have been from the hall.

Between his legs, the weight of his erections dripping away.

This was the part he always looked forward to the most. When the creature's casual use of him proved _almost_ too much, almost being the key word, and like a reward for overcoming something that had challenged him, the discomfort melted seamlessly into pure pleasure.

“ _So rough with me_...” he praised. “ _So cruel_...”

The pet's tongue dragging, parting the feathers on the back of his neck. The scrabble of hind claws searching for purchase. Hips pistoning, claws pricking red lines, and every now and then, a spot struck within him that caused his senses to melt and his own tongue to want to loll.

_Allowing_ it to loll, and himself to moan, the dizzying knowledge that he could be as wanton and filthy as he wanted, because the pet could not judge him for it, nor talk even if it could.

“ _Good creature, good thing...so wonderful to your master...take me, take me,_ _ **breed**_ _me.”_

And on and on, a river of unspeakable things gasped and choked and murmured. A debauched litany that only ceased when the pet took his neck in a mating bite, higher up his neck than that of a Skeksis so he didn't need to compare it, or think of what it might mean if in the end, they were all just tendon chewing wild beasts that had learned to put on silks.

When he came, it was loud and sharp, the white heat that took his senses made audible. The pet held him still as he jumped, stuttered, and climaxed like an animal – silent, factual, filling a mate with its litter.

It was still buried to the hilt when skekSo grew tired of flitting along on the afterglow, and panting with his well-used hindquarters still in the air. Was still licking the bruised, bitten, sodden feathers of his throat when the Emperor reached up, scratched it on the neck, and uttered a final time...

“...Good pet.”

***

They shared a plate of roast crawlie afterwards, tiny bones crunching away in the stillness. A roll of mellow herb, passed back and forth.

A jug of water, a new carafe of wine.

“Do you ever wonder if our appetites are twisted?” skekMal asked.

SkekSo hooked the roll from between his dangling talons.

“Not in the slightest.”


	5. Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Messy food stuff in this one. The blame rests with me and not skekMal, who simply requested the Skeksis having group fun.

The Bluemouth harvest was not a particularly prestigious event, nor was it synonymous with any milestone of great significance across Thra. It was simply a time of year in which the Bluemouth plants, roots fat and replete with prey, relaxed their grasping vines and allowed any species that might be passing by free access to its coveted fruit, in hopes of spreading the seeds while the ground was at its most fertile.

The Stonewood warriors celebrated by baking the overripe, pulpy blue fruit into cakes. The Vapra preferred to brew cordial, paired with pastries decorated with glistening threads of spun-sugar lace. The Podlings, true to form, made casks and casks of wine.

And the Skeksis...

“Make sure to get plenty on his nipples.”

“Oh yes, it wouldn't do to leave those neglected.”

“Sire, you're absolutely _delectable_.”

SkekSo was, per Castle tradition no one had ever planned or banked upon, was stretched out on a blanket like a roast dressed for the feast. The Skeksis crowded around him, jugs and bowls and pitchers of Bluemouth syrup at hand, claws and beaks blue with the stuff that they applied to his skin with brushes, careful pours, but more often than not, with naked fingertips.

The first taste of that welcome harvest, consumed with rapture from his person when everyone's tongues were still at their most hungry for it; before the cloyingness had set in, before everyone's mouths had numbed with it.

“What _is_ that you're attempting, Scientist?” he asked, voice surprisingly steady for a being with no less than three tongues on his erections. “A Podling witching symbol?”

“The sign of the Brothers, your excellence,” skekTek answered, glancing up. “Befitting of your lovely hip bone.”

“It looks like a seat of leisure, but by all means, do keep at it. It's a rather particular spot of mine.”

Truth be told, skekSo could have just as happily submitted to their doting without the layering on of culinary glaze, which was untidy, left the room smelling of it for days, and always left him with the nagging fear that he would awaken in the middle of the night covered in ants. But it was a gratifying feeling nonetheless, their moans of rapture soaking into his skin as they lathed him with their undivided attention.

When they spread his vent and poured out a thin drizzle, and skekLach's greedy tongue took the honor of stealing the first laps, it was difficult to be too concerned with anything.

“You're gluttonous, loathsome creatures,” he teased in his dry way, even as his back arched and his voice caught. “You'd show a Landstrider such attentions, provided it were covered in Bluemouth.”

“Nonsense,” skekLi shot back, licking a drop of syrup from beneath his chin. “Landstriders don't sigh half as prettily as you, Sire.”

It wasn't funny, so of course they all laughed. And soon, skekSo had reached that familiar, happy mark in which he lost track of whose mouth was doing what.

All save the feeling of skekMal's tongue near his neck. The rough, decadent sound of his growl.

These, he would have recognized anywhere.

***

“Slather it on me, dear Ritual-Master! Spare not a single drop!”

“Oh...oh, you've made such a mess of me...How filthy I am now!”

“ _Oh, luscious!_ My dear, I could devour you all night! _”_

The evening didn't maintain a sense of order for long once skekSo had pushed their heads away from his oversensitized vent; it never did. They'd yet to reach the point of upending casks of syrup over their own heads, though he suspected every trine brought them closer to the day that finally happened. The floor, when walked upon, made a sickly sucking sound and clung to the soles of one's feet. They poured it on, in, and around each other until their vibrant colors were obscured beneath a sheen of blue...all writhing away, sticky as Snoutlings in swill.

SkekSo presided over it all from his spot at the head of the room, sipping away on his wine – with all that syrup floating around, it paid to have something stronger on hand. SkekMal reclined near to his side, chewing a finger bone, feathers of his thighs slightly damp from where he'd indulged in some earlier frottage with the Path-Breaker, but nothing more scandalous. SkekSo was privately grateful that the Hunter had always had little taste for overly sweet things.

“Here,” he offered, passing his goblet. “Very dry. The antithesis of all things Bluemouth.”

“To your foresight,” skekMal said, lifting it slightly.

Things were rolling along rather predictably thus far. SkekOk was more syrup than Skeksis, and squealing beneath skekLi's tongue. SkekLach and skekNa were consuming whole fruits from each other's mouths. SkekGra was stuffed to bursting with skekZok while skekSil rode his face.

His eyes, however, were mostly trained on the Ornamentalist and the Gourmand. Until recently, the two had been a mere memory at evening functions such as these – their new relationship all consuming, a well-known fact about the Castle, and curiously – somewhat frustratingly – private. Every now and then, they would deign to let the world look on as they fondled one another, but seemed quite determined no one but themselves would ever see the other climax, hoarding one another away the way Bluemouths hoarded fruit.

Even now, they'd sequestered themselves off in a relatively private corner of the room, licking and slurping syrup like it wasn't the syrup they were savoring. The moment they got an inkling that one should be inside the other, off they'd retreat, sentimental and secretive as Gelfling.

“There's our future for you,” skekSo pointed out to skekMal. “Whimpering and cooing, on one another like old married Podlings, forbidding ourselves from so much as glancing at anyone else.”

“They had no qualms with glancing at you when you were making yourself heard down the hall,” skekMal replied, and skekSo didn't like that he couldn't tell whether he was joking.

“You know what I mean.”

SkekMal raised his brows, looking him over carefully. “...Something on your mind? _”_

SkekSo weighed the idea, the tantalizing possibility. SkekMal inside him, taking him in full view of everyone...the kind of thing they could do a thousand times, but the first time only once, and whether he wanted it to take place while everyone and everything was covered in jam components.

“...Would you perhaps be amenable to trying something new?”

“Have I ever not been?'

“...SkekSil! Come here.”

The Cantor's head – which had been tilted back in bliss – jerked upright and turned in said direction with wide eyes, apparently taken back by the fact that he'd been summoned at all. SkekSo had barely completed a nod before skekSil was on his feet, skekGra's tongue curling away at nothing. If either he or skekZok took offense, skekSo never noticed it before the Cantor was seated before him.

“Yes, sire?”

“The Hunter and I grow weary of spectating. How ready are you feeling?”

“Never readier, my liege.”

“Would you like to join skekMal and I for a little experiment? ”

He may as well have asked whether skekSil wanted a seat on the throne and crawlies delivered to his beak for life. The other Skeksis was vibrating with unabashed delight.

“Oh, yes, _oh yes!_ Would like nothing more than that, would be honored! Please, take me, use me for sire and Hunter's pleasure!”

“For Crystal's sake. Don't void your bladder, Chamberlain,” called skekLach sourly from where they were taking up skekSil's old position astride skekGra's beak.

“Or do so!” put in skekNa, stealing a lick of skekZok's nipple before having his face shoved away. “Some of us would prefer that!”

SkekSo began to be very glad he had not opted for his and the Hunter's first public coupling to take place tonight.

SkekMal ignored them all, tugging skekSil back to rest in his lap. “Alright for you, Cantor?” SkekSil's dusty blue feathers rippled pleasurably against skekMal's deeper, richer blues; his perfumed and manicured softness a stark contrast to the Hunter's muscles and scars, and they made such an attractive sight together that SkekSo let slide the irritation of skekMal asking someone's preferences before his own.

“Oh...this is fine. So much more than fine.”

“I hope you're aware that you're still not covering me,” said skekSo, parting skekSil's knees with the back of a hand. “Nor will I be entering you.”

“Whatever Emperor and Hunter would use me for. Anything, anything at all.”

“Anything?”

“Without question.”

“Excellent answer,” skekSo replied coolly. He rubbed skekSil's slits with a thumb, eliciting a soft shiver; skekMal mouthed the feathered throat. Increasingly aware that one by one, the Skeksis were fixing the trio with their full attention. “Now...close your eyes, Cantor.”

SkekSil did. SkekSo, ignoring the Hunter's quizzical stare, reached across the table, where a nearly untouched platter of Bluemouth fruit sat waiting...selected the largest, fattest, softest one.

And carefully, daintily, scored off the top with his talons.

The Hunter, as always, caught on before anyone else, and cocked an eyebrow. The others were not far behind, a ripple of knowing chuckles rising, but if skekSil's inner alarm bells ever rang, he kept this to himself. SkekSo stroked the Cantor to full hardness, both for practical purposes and a reward for his unflagging trust.

“Ready now? And here...we...”

Down, down, slowly onto all three erections, penetrating the blue, pulpy fruit with overripened ease. A sickly wet squish. A trickle of pale juice, the color of the summer sky.

SkekSil moaned, conspicuously loud. The room, skekSo noticed, had gone very, very quiet.

“ _Mmm...”_

“Tell me what's on your mind, skekSil,” skekSo commanded softly, working the Bluemouth up and down and over, rotating it whenever it passed the heads.

“So soft,” the Cantor simpered, hips moving to meet each sloppy slide. “So wet...feels wonderful...Emperor is so good to skekSil.”

SkekMal was staring at him, and not entirely approvingly, for a moment – just the briefest of moments – skekSo searched his heart, wondered whether he was truly mean enough to let this continue...whether it had even been mean to do it in the first place. On someone like _skekOk_ , certainly, but...

“Permission granted.”

SkekSil's green eyes blinked open, settled first on the Emperor's face. On his hand, and the Bluemouth fruit that was drooling all over his most intimate parts, staining them as blue as his feathers. The silence that had grown so much thicker in so little time fell away as he chuckled.

“ _Thought_ it might be that, or else new toy...”

“You like it?”

“Of course! Please, by all means, more!”

The Skeksis all laughed, and it was like the return of the sun, the return of things warm and familiar. Of course it had all turned out fine. They could never be _truly_ cruel to one another, not really. This was the life they'd carved out for themselves, and this was what it meant to be Skeksis; debauched and happy and free. Whatever had nibbled on the Emperor's mood had come and gone, and in its place, he felt nothing but fondness for his ridiculous subjects

SkekSo worked the Bluemouth with a gracious will, and the Cantor in turn thrust into it like he'd been courting it with wine and song all night. SkekMal stopped shooting him nagging glances and took to playing with skekSil's nipples, his own erections soon swallowed up by the clasp of skekSil's capable fingers.

“Always knew you were a filthy thing...what other secrets are you hiding?”

“Oh, just a few. Would be more than happy to show Emperor and Hunter...”

“One secret at a time,” skekSo joked. Mostly joked.

There wasn't time to discuss it in too deep a depth; the whole group was stirred up now, and more than that, they'd been handed an arsenal of innovative new ideas to try. There was a mad dash for the bowls and platters of whole Bluemouth fruits, a clamor of squawking voices, a brief flurry of clashing teeth.

SkekSo watched in a mix of amusement and disgust as skekTek and skekOk tried to force themselves into the same fruit, smearing pulp and skin. SkekGra had already gotten the hang of it, tongue lolling, hips working into a fruit nearly the size of a Gelfling's head. SkekZok had peeled a fruit that was clearly plucked too soon from the vine, small and hard and gray, and cried out in jubilation as he pressed it to his slits.

“ _Ahhh!_ Such a delightful burn!”

SkekEkt and skekAyuk had stopped pawing at each other entirely, and were watching with wide, spectator's eyes. There was something rather satisfying about that.

“Your mighty kingdom,” skekMal teased, because he could get away with it.

“That you come in from the forest for, and time and time again.”

The fruit had nearly turned to mush in his hand, pulverized under the increasingly wild, erratic bucks of skekSil's hips, leaving the Emperor to beg the question of whether he ought to stop and locate a fresh one or stroke his subject to climax with a handful of jelly. He compensated by clenching tighter around the tearing, sodden skin, and fortunately, it turned out to be enough; skekSil suddenly howled, skekMal pinching his nipples accordingly hard, ejaculate spurting out and mingling with the pulp and skin and juice.

“Oh, oh Emperor...Hunter... _thank you._ ”

SkekMal growled into his throat feathers a final time. SkekSo wiped his hand daintily on someone's discarded silks.

He reached for his forgotten chalice of wine, and was just finishing the last bi when skekLi and skekLach approached, fruit bowl in hand, heads low and submissive, but eyes sparkling with mischief, and with boldness.

“Sire,” began skekLi. “Now, you'll forgive us if we're being too forward, _but_...”

“We want to work the fruit over you and then lick it off you.”

“...And then skekLach wants you to juice one using just the muscles under your tail, and then squeeze it into their mouth.”

SkekSo fixed them both with a long, even stare. He had a sudden flash of SoSu the way the texts described him, articulate and confident as he presided over the experiments upon the Crystal, and wondered if this was the future he'd ever envisioned.

“You have permission to work the fruit over me and then lick it off. Refill my chalice and then, just possibly, we _may_ discuss the rest.”

“ _HUZZAH!”_

SkekLi ran off with the chalice. SkekSo made himself comfortable on the driest spot he could eek out on the blankets, knees drifting apart as skekLach peeled the top off a fruit. He looked over to where skekMal had laid out on his back, skekSil astride his lap and already thrusting their members together. SkekOk, apparently having given up on double-teaming the fruit and sensing a group bonding experience, was slinking between the Hunter's legs, touching the deep blue ankle for permission to proceed, all the while licking his narrow beak.

“Such a hard, fraught life you all lead here in the Castle,” he remarked.

SkekSo shook his head as a chalice of fine old wine was placed in one of his left hands and skekLach touched his leaking tips to the Bluemouth fruit.

“And how courageously we do bear it.”

***

Hours later, in one of the ancillary communal sleeping chambers, a clean and dry skekSo watched the stars blink through half lidded eyes.

SkekMal crouched atop him, moving lazily within him, their tails entwined. The low, persistent growl that vibrated in the Hunter's chest was not enough to wake the Skeksis that snored around them. And if their claws found each other, tangled together as if to pass a note laden with things unspoken, there were no conscious gazes to fall upon it.

“Tell me what you need,” skekMal said softly. Meant just for his ears, and just for him. “What would bring you joy.”

SkekSo closed his eyes.

“...Don't stop.”


End file.
